NFP with a non-Catholic spouse - how does that work?

[HomeschoolDad]

Aside from isolated exceptions and small religious groups, doctrinally orthodox Catholics, faithful to the magisterium, are the only people in the world who see contraception as morally evil, in and of itself. The rest of the world has accepted contraception as an intelligent, progressive, responsible method of customizing the size of one’s family, and relatively few people would be at peace with remaining potentially open to children they haven’t planned to have. (When “accidents happen”, they typically either accept the child they didn’t plan and manage to be happy about it, or they have a discreet abortion and never tell anyone.) Non-Catholics typically feel no more discomfort with using contraception, than a faithful Catholic would feel over taking a drink of alcohol, eating pork, or getting a blood transfusion. They simply don’t see anything wrong with it, and a bride shortly before the wedding (unless she’s already sexually active) has her doctor to “put her on birth control” as a matter of course.

How, then, does it work when a faithful Catholic marries a non-Catholic and asks the spouse to use NFP, and only NFP, for the duration of the marriage? How common is this? Does the non-Catholic accept this state of affairs, even though they see nothing wrong with ABC, and everything just goes merrily along? Do couples have this conversation before the marriage, or after? (I would certainly hope they wouldn’t wait until after they’re married to come to terms with this!) And do engagements ever get broken over this issue? Is there a gender difference at play here — does it differ depending on whether the non-Catholic spouse is the husband or the wife?

In my Catholic high school days, 40+ years ago, I do recall several large families with Catholic mothers and non-Catholic fathers. The NFP of that time was the crude, notoriously unreliable “rhythm” method, which made use of the calendar, and the calendar alone. You typically had children a year or two apart, and six children or more was the norm in these families. I cannot recall whether there was ever a case of a Catholic father and a non-Catholic mother in such circumstances — there may have been, but no cases come to mind.

 

[TheLittleLady]

This discussion comes way before marriage is planned. If your girlfriend/boyfriend does not agree to God’s plan for sexuality, you wish them well and find someone who does.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

This discussion comes way before marriage is planned. If your girlfriend/boyfriend does not agree to God’s plan for sexuality, you wish them well and find someone who does.

One would certainly hope so.

I can just foresee someone being “so much in love”, fancying that they have found someone they just absolutely, positively, have to marry, that they would think the “NFP thing” shouldn’t be something that would force them apart. I do not advocate getting to this point — your advice is very wise and exactly what I would say — but I can see, especially in a culture such as ours where “love is everything”, even faithful Catholics, accepting the Church’s teachings, not being able to comprehend why they must part ways with a non-Catholic fiancé/e who won’t agree to NFP.

The very first date is not too soon for a person to ask themselves “is this someone who will help me get to heaven?”.

 

[TheLittleLady]

Which is why we frequently read such posts on here where someone marries another person and they do not agree on these foundational things.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

Which is why we frequently read such posts on here where someone marries another person and they do not agree on these foundational things.

Yep, you got that right.

 

[Emeraldlady]

How, then, does it work when a faithful Catholic marries a non-Catholic and asks the spouse to use NFP, and only NFP, for the duration of the marriage?

In my experience faithful Catholics have a natural Catholic ‘aura’. (Can I use that word?) If a girlfriend/boyfriend are happy to date you in a chaste way, they are already preparing for a possible chaste married life. I found that when you weren’t prepared to have sex with a date, they lose interest when there are so many woman out there prepared to give that. Thankfully my now husband thought I was special enough to respect my life choices.

I think it becomes a very hard road when people marry already sexually active and contracepting, then have a conversion or reversion which means having to tackle a whole new ‘restricted’ sexual life. Especially if one party isn’t on board with it.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

In my experience faithful Catholics have a natural Catholic ‘aura’. (Can I use that word?) If a girlfriend/boyfriend are happy to date you in a chaste way, they are already preparing for a possible chaste married life. I found that when you weren’t prepared to have sex with a date, they lose interest when there are so many woman out there prepared to give that. Thankfully my now husband thought I was special enough to respect my life choices.

I would hardly know how to date in today’s secular world. From the anecdotal evidence I hear, it is just assumed that sex will take place on, or before, the third date, and abstinence until marriage isn’t even treated as an option. Even if a couple is more restrained, up to five or six dates is the absolute outer limit for remaining chaste.

I hope this isn’t interpreted as a commercial endorsement, but as a practical matter, I think the only workable way to find a faithful Catholic spouse, is to go on one of the Catholic dating websites such as CatholicMatch, Ave Maria Singles, or Catholic Singles, and find someone locally if you can, long-distance if you must (though someone then has to move eventually). CatholicMatch has a “seven out of seven” option, meaning the profile user affirms that they accept seven key tenets of the Catholic Faith, including teachings on contraception and premarital sex.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

While non-Catholics might not see artificial contraception as morally wrong, there are plenty of people, Catholic and non-Catholic, who don’t like artificial contraception for reasons other than morals. Birth control pills and other hormonal methods can cause various undesirable side effects in women, and can feel very unnatural if one is used to normal cycle ups and downs in energy, mood etc. I’ve met a lot of women who aren’t religious at all (or are into “spiritual but not religious”, New Age, wicca, yoga etc) but do not want to take any kind of pharmaceutical, including BCP. Many men also don’t like the feeling of sex with a condom and flat out refuse to use them. Many people of both genders also don’t want to undergo surgery.

Also, as I’ve said on a large number of these threads, not everybody is getting married with the expectation or plan of having sex constantly, or with sex being a big priority in the marriage. Those who are not having a problem with abstaining don’t tend to announce it because first, it’s private business, and second, unless it’s a very visible situation of one partner having a serious illness such as cancer, other people in today’s society would tend to be critical or judgmental of them for “not having enough sex,” and would likely make derogatory remarks about the individuals, their marriage, their ability to have sex, their sexual orientation, their physical attractiveness, etc.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

While non-Catholics might not see artificial contraception as morally wrong, there are plenty of people, Catholic and non-Catholic, who don’t like artificial contraception for reasons other than morals. Birth control pills and other hormonal methods can cause various undesirable side effects in women, and can feel very unnatural if one is used to normal cycle ups and downs in energy, mood etc. I’ve met a lot of women who aren’t religious at all (or are into “spiritual but not religious”, New Age, wicca, yoga etc) but do not want to take any kind of pharmaceutical, including BCP. Many men also don’t like the feeling of sex with a condom and flat out refuse to use them. Many people of both genders also don’t want to undergo surgery.

Also, as I’ve said on a large number of these threads, not everybody is getting married with the expectation or plan of having sex constantly, or with sex being a big priority in the marriage. Those who are not having a problem with abstaining don’t tend to announce it because first, it’s private business, and second, unless it’s a very visible situation of one partner having a serious illness such as cancer, other people in today’s society would tend to be critical or judgmental of them for “not having enough sex,” and would likely make derogatory remarks about the individuals, their marriage, their ability to have sex, their sexual orientation, their physical attractiveness, etc.

I don’t disagree with a word you say, and I am aware there is a subculture that dislikes pharmaceuticals and any artificial intervention in a person’s life (especially if that intervention enriches big corporate interests) — the sort of people who subscribe to Utne Reader and seek out sustainable, earth-friendly lifestyles. You do not have to be a New Ager or a Wiccan to partake of this lifestyle, and there is absolutely nothing about it incompatible with Catholicism. I subscribed to Utne for several years (until it got so corporate) and have an almost-complete set of Whole Earth Review gleaned from eBay and used bookstores. So this lifestyle is not something I disrespect, quite the opposite.

It is true that some people go into marriage with the expectation of a low-sex or even sexless marriage, and if they choose to do that, for whatever reason, that is their business. Some people are physically unable to contemplate any other sort of marriage. The only requirement is that they be physically able to consummate the marriage, and that they do nothing deliberately to frustrate the marital act by artificial means. There are Josephite marriages, and marriages that for all practical purposes might as well be Josephite or nearly enough so. Nonetheless, the norm is for married couples, at least if they are reasonably young and in good health, to have conjugal intimacy and to have it relatively often. If this is the case, the question of procreation, and how to deal with it, is going to be a core issue, and Catholics have to make up their minds whether they are going to follow the Church’s teachings, or accept secular mores here, and do what most people do.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

If you have seen my comments in another thread, my inquiry to the CDF about the licit use of NFP has been sent to Rome, and while I hope for a response, I recognize that Rome has “bigger fish to fry” than one layman’s inquiry, and I’m not holding my breath. I just know that Rome has been very good about answering questions from SSPX adherents (the questions about whether attendance at SSPX Masses is permitted, and concerning the presence of clearly visible fragments of the Host in a controlled experiment where communion is received in the hand), and hope they might treat my inquiry similarly. Considering that it relates to a very serious point of Catholic moral theology — as opposed to an interpretation of canon law or a quasi-scientific study — they might not.

 

[Peonies]

My husband is Buddhist. We practice NFP and contraception has never been a part of our marriage. My husband may not always understand my values, but he does respect them. Just like I would never sneak an animal product onto one of his vegan meals, he would not think of asking me to compromise my values and faith.

I think respect is a big part of it.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

Nonetheless, the norm is for married couples, at least if they are reasonably young and in good health, to have conjugal intimacy and to have it relatively often.

The fact that you hold this up as “The Norm” because it is the societal expectation, and that you would suggest that a marriage with the NFP abstentions a “low sex marriage” is just proving my point about assumptions. People simply assume that a healthy, “normal” couple is going to want to have sex every day or almost every day, and if they don’t, they’re “not the norm”, and further, that it’s always going to be a big hardship for them to go without sex for the time windows required for NFP.

The frequency of sex expectations depends on the individual couple, and nobody else. One couple might be expecting to have sex twice a day and another couple might be expecting to have it once a week, or even twice a month. Both couples are “normal”, they simply have different priorities and perhaps differences in libido or in their preferred way of showing love for each other.

I would hope couples would discuss this stuff with each other before they get married. When I got engaged I had known my husband very, very well for 10 years and we still had a discussion about this.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

The fact that you hold this up as “The Norm” because it is the societal expectation, and that you would suggest that a marriage with the NFP abstentions a “low sex marriage” is just proving my point about assumptions. People simply assume that a healthy, “normal” couple is going to want to have sex every day or almost every day, and if they don’t, they’re “not the norm”, and further, that it’s always going to be a big hardship for them to go without sex for the time windows required for NFP.

When I say “the norm”, I am merely stating that this is what people in marriages tend to do. No condemnation or moral judgment is implied. It is merely an observation. It is not “the norm” to be vegetarian, not to have a television in one’s home, or to rely solely on public transportation in lieu of owning a car. Surely people do these things, but it is relatively uncommon.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

All the things you mention are “relatively uncommon” in your own experience. In places like Europe and New York City and other major US cities, there are large numbers of people who are vegetarian and/or do not own cars and/or don’t have TVs (unless the TV is a monitor for hooking up the streaming laptop). People are pretty open about these things and we can tell by consumer patterns of whether veg restaurants are flourishing and public transportation is heavily used. Sexual frequency on the other hand is widely variant and apart from dubious “surveys” we really don’t know what goes on between couples. We tend to only hear about the relationships that are a problem. The media also is focused on pushing stories of people having a lot of a sex rather than people who abstain for whatever reason.

I believe you’ve posted threads before where you’ve basically assumed that everybody is having sex all the time and that if Catholic couples don’t have a certain number of children then they must certainly be using artificial contraception. I think it’s time you started challenging your thinking about other people’s sex lives and realized that it’s not all like your own personal assumptions.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

All the things you mention are “relatively uncommon” in your own experience . In places like Europe and New York City and other major US cities, there are large numbers of people who are vegetarian and/or do not own cars and/or don’t have TVs (unless the TV is a monitor for hooking up the streaming laptop). People are pretty open about these things and we can tell by consumer patterns of whether veg restaurants are flourishing and public transportation is heavily used. Sexual frequency on the other hand is widely variant and apart from dubious “surveys” we really don’t know what goes on between couples. We tend to only hear about the relationships that are a problem. The media also is focused on pushing stories of people having a lot of a sex rather than people who abstain for whatever reason.

I believe you’ve posted threads before where you’ve basically assumed that everybody is having sex all the time and that if Catholic couples don’t have a certain number of children then they must certainly be using artificial contraception. I think it’s time you started challenging your thinking about other people’s sex lives and realized that it’s not all like your own personal assumptions.

This is a forum based in the United States, and when I make a statement such as this, I am referring to the United States unless I say otherwise. I am quite aware that NYC (and Europe) differ from Middle America in many ways. The average American is not vegetarian, has a TV in their home, and is heavily reliant upon driving their own car, using public transportation infrequently if at all. As far as how couples handle their intimate lives, I just know from anecdotal evidence, common knowledge, and how people answer surveys. Pollsters are not idiots and they are very good at extrapolating mass behavior from carefully chosen sample populations. You didn’t say this, but the question “how do you know, have you interviewed everyone?” is just a thought-killer when someone doesn’t like somebody else’s assertions. We have polls, many, many of them, that demonstrate that American Catholics almost universally reject Humanae vitae. The most recent one I read, said that 8 percent of American Catholics accept the Church’s teaching on birth control. I was ecstatic that it was that many! Seriously.

I do not assume that “everybody is having sex all the time”, and I don’t think I ever said such a thing. Unless massive numbers of people are lying, however, frequent conjugal relations are the norm among married couples of certain crucial age groups, and infrequent relations, or no relations at all, are uncommon. I simply do not believe that there is a huge number of “closeted heterosexual near-celibate” married people, of a young and virile age, who are not having sex, or having it very infrequently, but claiming, and leading everyone around them to assume, that they do.

 

[maryjk]

I think it becomes a very hard road when people marry already sexually active and contracepting, then have a conversion or reversion which means having to tackle a whole new ‘restricted’ sexual life. Especially if one party isn’t on board with it.

I reverted well after I was married.

It really wasn’t a problem for us.

My husband was on board with and understood my reversion. So he was willing to give it a chance. Thankfully I was able to find an NFP only GYN, since I had pretty serious reason to avoid pregnancy.

But I am sure many couples have problems with that.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

My husband is Buddhist. We practice NFP and contraception has never been a part of our marriage. My husband may not always understand my values, but he does respect them. Just like I would never sneak an animal product onto one of his vegan meals, he would not think of asking me to compromise my values and faith.

I think respect is a big part of it.

This is excellent, and is precisely how interfaith marriages between a Catholic and a non-Catholic should be. Sadly, I suspect that this scenario is not at all common.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

HomeschoolDad:

my inquiry to the CDF about the licit use of NFP has been sent to Rome,

Why are you so interested in other folks’ sex lives and contraceptive habits? My understanding is that you are divorced and planning to remain single. Yet so many of your posts are on this topic.

One word: souls.

We know from traditional Catholic moral theology that any deliberate, complete sin of the flesh is grave matter. There is no such thing as a sufficiently known, fully deliberate and willful, venial sin of the flesh. Put another way, all complete sexual sins, given the three conditions, are mortal sins.

If contraception is not a sin of the flesh, I don’t know what is. What other kind of sin could it be? It is basically mutual pleasuring. You could argue that it is a sin against charity, or sacrilege against the sacrament of matrimony, and it may be those things too, but it is first and foremost a sin of the flesh. Our Lady of Fatima told Jacinta that the sins that send more people to hell, than any other kinds of sins, are the sins of the flesh.

In the most recent poll I read, 92 percent of American Catholics reject the Church’s teaching on contraception. It is not unreasonable to think that the same proportion, or near enough to it, actually commit this sin, so it is not just an academic or hypothetical situation that does not apply to them. Put another way, probably 90+/- percent of Catholic married couples in this country use contraception. As I said above, to say “how do you know? have you interviewed everyone?” is just a thought-killer, an attempt to derail the entire conversation. I have fallen for this in the past, and I’m not going to fall for it anymore. As I said also, pollsters are not idiots, and opinion polls are very accurate. So I think we can go with the 90+/-% figure.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

All right, after having granted all of this, you will hear the objection “but they don’t know they’re committing a mortal sin”. Perhaps not. I may be wrong, but I don’t think a whole lot of high-level, “should we accept Humanae vitae, or should we not?” thinking goes on in today’s Catholic world, at least not in this country. No, people just flatly say “the Church is wrong”. I don’t think they tie themselves in knots agonizing over “why”. They do what they want to, they do what they see everyone else in society doing, and they just don’t see anything wrong with it. The Catholic Church stands virtually alone in condemning contraception. And let’s face it, Catholics generally follow the lead of the larger society on matters of morality — “what all good people have in common”. That’s a Masonic mindset, pure and simple. Just got to call it what it is.

Much is made of people not being culpable — they don’t know it’s wrong, they’re in good conscience about it, they have circumstances that force them to use contraception, and so on. Perhaps they are not fully culpable. I hope they’re not. I don’t want to see anyone go to hell. I’d give all of them a free pass on the issue. But I’m not God.

And even if we grant that they’re not culpable and do not incur the punishment due to mortal sin, what then? Is the Church — are apostolic Catholic laymen in forums such as this one — just supposed to keep their mouths shut, not call attention to the issue, leave people in good conscience about the matter? Allow their children and grandchildren to be led astray on this matter? To imagine from this day forward, to the end of the world, that “the Church doesn’t know what she’s talking about, pay her no mind, there is nothing wrong with this?”. You will hear this a lot from European secularized Catholics — “oh, pfui to the priest, the priest, he does not know, he thinks he is the emissary of God, we live in modern times now”. I have dealt with a lot of Europeans, so I know whereof I speak. If nobody stands up and calls this out for what it is, do we just get to a point where nobody accepts the teaching, and it’s a dead letter confined to theological discourses that nobody reads anyway? I’m sure there are people in the Church who would be pleased to see this happen. Just remember — the serpent told Eve that she would not die. The first sin in the history of mankind was basically “this isn’t wrong, God is a liar, I’m going to do it”. And look how that turned out.

Now, as to your comment about me. Yes, I am divorced. I will probably remain by myself for life. But then again I may not. There may be an annulment. My wife might die. If I ever do marry, the whole NFP/child-bearing issue will most certainly be front and center. I am almost 60 years old and I have a very modest retirement income. It would be highly imprudent for me to marry a woman who could conceive a child. So, no, it will never be an issue for me. But to say “I am only going to care about moral matters if they directly affect me” is contrary to Christian charity. It is saying, in effect, "I am not my brother’s keeper".

 

[losh14]

Can’t speak from personal experience but we’ve noticed that it’s more common for a Catholic wife to say “we’re using NFP” than a non-Catholic wife with a Catholic husband. We’ve also known Catholic husbands to get vasectomies after the 2nd or 3rd kid. Some of our friends teased me about when I’d join the “V-Club”. Haven’t told them yet we’re expecting our 4th